Production cut. Nobody obeys the United States anymore

In order to conclude an agreement with King Ibn Saud “oil in exchange for security”, US President Roosevelt in February 1945 gave up his beloved cigars for two days, which were hated like alcohol by the hard-line Wahhabi monarchy. What must Biden give up today in order to obey the black murderer, Prince Muhammad bin Salman? With OPEC and Russia, Riyadh has reduced its daily crude oil production by more than a million barrels by focusing on a significant price increase: the exact opposite of what the Americans have been asking since last year for the Saudi kingdom, once the United States’ biggest ally. in the region with Israel.

No one obeys the Americans in terms of energy policy, but rather the restWith the exception of the Europeans, who, with Putin’s aggression against Ukraine, imposed sanctions on Russian production of gas and crude oil. Other OPEC countries such as Kuwait, the United Arab Emirates – a member of the Abraham Accords with Israel – and Algeria have followed Saudi Arabia’s lead, while Russia plans to continue cutting production until the end of 2023. Analysts expect sharp increases. The American investment bank, Goldman Sachs, raised its estimates for the Brent price to 95 and 100 dollars per barrel, respectively, for the years 2023 and 2024. This will return to the levels of last August. You will also notice the repercussions of this on the increase in inflation due to the rise in fuel and transportation prices, and the risk is that after a short period, the costs of the shopping bag and electricity and gas bills will rise again.

The disagreement between Washington and Riyadh is clear. In October 2022, the White House accused Saudi Arabia of siding with Russia because, despite the energy crisis, Riyadh appears to be acting on Moscow’s side. Then the Saudis were annoyed that the Biden administration publicly ruled out new purchases of crude oil to replenish US strategic stocks. Previously, the White House had assured Saudi Arabia of the exact opposite.

behind all this There is a powerful geopolitical development for an increasingly polar part of the world that is not following Washington’s direction. It is the recognition that twenty years of American and Western initiatives in the Middle East, from the war in Afghanistan to Iraq, to ​​Libya, to Syria itself, have ended in disaster. The illusions of the Arab Spring disappeared in 2011, Obama’s agreements with Tehran on nuclear energy were shattered (Trump canceled them), the Kurds were abandoned and betrayed, and the Palestinians descended into unacceptable double standards that regularly violated every UN resolution for decades, all that remains in Washington is A few sheikhs, namely a general, Sisi, who needs Saudi money to keep Egypt afloat and an uncomfortable NATO ally like Erdogan, who does everything to keep the alliance in check and show goodwill. With Putin, without imposing sanctions on Moscow and brokering agreements on wheat that are necessary not to starve the southern hemisphere.

Erdogan in front of a crowd of right-wing gray wolvesThe assembled Akp allies in light of the May 14 elections declared in no uncertain terms that it was “preparing to teach the United States a lesson” and attacked Biden directly because the US ambassador to Turkey had visited his rival, Republican Kemal Kilicdaroglu. As is known, the Turkish leadership accuses the United States of participating with the Fethullah Gulen network (in exile in the United States since 1999) in the failed coup in July 2016. Thus, it was Putin who congratulated Erdogan on his rule. Narrow escape NATO allies of Turkey.

Let me be clear: The United States has certainly not given up on the Middle East. The American Fifth Fleet is in Bahrain, and units of American soldiers are everywhere, from Qatar to Syria to Iraq, where the Federal Reserve, twenty years after the 2003 war, still controls all Iraqi oil revenues. Not to mention the fact that in Israel, despite its increasingly illiberal structure, US military aid is pouring in abundantly. However, it is clear that the recent agreements between Saudi Arabia and Iran, as well as those that released customs duties for the Syrian Assad in the Arab world, have weakened the American grip on the Gulf. Here, the Americans have one major interest: controlling energy flows to Asia and China. They do not want to give this up, but the task is much more complex than forcing the Europeans to withdraw from Russia and from North Stream 1 and 2 that the US has openly targeted since 2021, before Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and attack. Of course, the future is not rosy. The agreements between Tehran and Riyadh are between two states that share the defense of an obscurantist and patriarchal social order: a horizon as black as oil.